To Catch a Predator

I was a little drunk and a lot horny and lonely and online cruising for men and had about fourteen chat windows open and I'd started to forget who was who and what I'd told all of them. Apparently I'd told this one I'd come over because he kept !!!ing me about directions and a number and what I'd be wearing when I showed up. Then he asked me if I was generou$ and I wrote sometimes, are you? and he typed ISO genero$ity...and I wrote me 2 wondering how he had misspelled it twice and then he sent me an emoticon with its tongue sticking out. From what I remember I was chatting with a married funeral director, an artist, a bartender, the kids' drivers' ed teacher, a hockey player, a couple looking for a third to relocate to Florida, a chub, a midget, a Brazilian in China, another father of two, and probably a few others. They'd all blended into one person and I couldn't keep all of their fantasies straight so some of them got mad or quit typing or found better and user left or got disconnected. Finally, this headless pic'd guy gives me his number and convinces me to come over because he lives down the block but we've never met or seen each other and I say ok, be right there and I put on some clothes and leave.

When I show up the slider door is cracked so I walk into this real nice brightly lit kitchen that has an island counter in the middle of it. I hear a voice from another room tell me he'll be right there. I look around, open a few cupboards and consider dimming the lights and then Stone Phillips walks into the room and says What have you been up to tonight? and I say Not much, just chatting online, and Stone Phillips gives me those questionable eyes of his that simultaneously turn me off and on. I say I didn't know you lived in Iowa and he asks me why I'm here and I say because he told me to come over and then he tells me to explain a little bit more about what we'd chatted about. I tell him I can't remember because I'd been chatting with so many people and I certainly can't remember chatting with Stone Phillips. I ask him again what he is doing and he says I'm busting perverts and I say oh I think it's weird that you do that and he gets a little offended or embarrassed and asks me if I remember chatting with an underage boy and I say most certainly not, Stone, all I really want is for someone to love me, and he puts his big tan arms around me before I can run away.

About the author:

Michael Wolfe is vgl, masc., mature, brn/brn, 5'7, 140ish iso a job. He's finishing an MFA at Texas State University - San Marcos, where he helped found FRONT PORCH (www.frontporchjournal.com).